Tiananmen Square, Forbidden City and Hutong Tour - Oh My! (Friday, April 11, 2014)

After a restless night of sleep in spite of being awake for nearly 48 hours, we prepared for the day, enjoyed an extravagant breakfast buffet and met our guide, Helen, in the lobby to visit a bank to exchange money for our excursions while in Beijing.

We returned to the hotel and met our driver and we were off to visit many of the local Beijing tourist locations.  Here's a photo of the outside of our hotel.

First, our driver let us out directly across the street from Tiananmen Square.  There were tons of people - none of which believe in forming lines to be able to see the area in an orderly fashion!  Almost instantly, we discovered that Ian and Aidan are celebrities in China.  People would approach us, want to touch their hair and take photographs with them.  Luckily, Helen is a registered guide in Beijing so she was able to get us through the security area very quickly.  Tiananmen Square is a very popular tourist location for the Chinese people because it is the final resting place for a former leader, Mao Ze Dong, and has several monuments and congressional buildings on the square.  No one mentioned the reason we as Americans know about Tiananmen Square - the 1989 pro-democracy protests and the hundreds of lives that were lost when martial law was imposed.

We entered the Forbidden City - once the home of the Chinese emperor for many centuries. It was elaborate and ornate and larger in life than I'd expected.  We'd seen the movie, The Last Emperor, which was filmed about one of the emperors and the entire film was made in the Forbidden City.

While in the Forbidden City, Helen left us standing in the middle of one area while she purchased our entry tickets. In just a moment, we were surrounded by about 30 people who wanted to take photos with Ian and Aidan.  They have their own paparazzi in China.  They draw a crowd wherever we go!  They were so excited to see our little white boys!

Helen took us to a local restaurant for lunch - fried pork and vegetable dumplings.  They were delicious!  The boys ate some noodles. We were also celebrities in this restaurant as Helen described to us that this was a local spot - we may be the only white people they've seen in a nearby restaurant in quite some time.  It was a tiny little place, but the staff was gracious and kind.

Then we visited the Hutong area of old Beijing - it's like any historic area in the US - think Old Salem with the horse drawn carriage rides replaced by rickshaws!  It was amazing to see a walking tour of a private home, a rickshaw tour of the community and a drum show.  The entire afternoon was a very educational experience for our family.

The private home was actually much more spacious than most.  Typically, a family will only have about 30 square meters for about 3 people - about 3 rooms and no private bathroom - they still had community bath houses.  They had birds that talked and greeted us in Chinese - hello, how are you?, have you eaten?

Then we went on a rickshaw tour of the streets of old Beijing.  To just ride through this area - wow - I have a new appreciation for America and what we have!

We finished up our Hutong tour with a drum ceremony at the drum tower.  It was once used in a similar way of telling time as a large city clock that chimes.  Only here, the drums are sounded to alert you of time.  And you had to climb the steepest steps I've ever seen!

Ian and Aidan completely enjoyed our guide Helen.  She's fantastic and the boys just loved her.

We walked about 6 blocks from our hotel to have dinner and visit a local mall.  Here's the inside of the Pizza Hut - very fancy compared to our Pizza Hut's in the US.

Then we browsed through the local mall - just to see how it compares to what we are accustomed to - to my surprise - they only have white Barbies with blonde hair and blue eyes!  Not an Asian Barbie in sight!

On Saturday, we will visit the Great Wall of China! 

We Left on a Jet Plane - or Two! (Wednesday, April 9, 2014 & Thursday, April 10, 2014)

After a whirlwind of packing over the last week and VERY little sleep on Tuesday night (because we were so excited/anxious), we flew from Charlotte to Chicago early Wednesday morning.

It was not an ideal plane size for our boys' first airplane flights - but they did a GREAT job on the two hour flight.  The plane was tiny - only 2 seats on each side of the aisle and the carry-ons had to stowed below because there was no room on board!  And we sat apart from each other because the flight was sold out.  And our small child might have fallen asleep on his neighbor.  

We landed in Chicago and had McDonalds lunch in the beautiful O'Hare Airport.  While waiting for the plane to depart, we met up with a couple also on their way to adopt from China - thanks Amy Regret de Leon for introducing us through email.  It's such a small world - I graduated from college with Amy who happens to live nearby the sweet family we had the pleasure of meeting together.  Good luck Morris family.

Then we boarded a plane in Chicago directly to Beijing.  Wow - the economy class seats were SOLD OUT.  So that means we sat shoulder to shoulder with our neighbors.  I'm thankful our traveling companions are small 8 and 5 year olds!  We were very thankful for the seat back entertainment that had a variety of movie and TV series options.  Some very excited boys were finally able to see Frozen.  And someone else may have been able to watch EVERY episode of Friends, How I Met Your Mother and The Big Bang Theory that our airline made available.  We were also able to recognize a favorite drink at our house while on the airplane - Sprite.  13 hours later we landed in Beijing at 3:15pm (NC time 3:15am).

 Our sweet guide, Helen, met us at the airport with a driver and rode with us to our hotel.  What we thought would be a 45 minute ride turned into well over an hour!  Gridlock, crazy drivers, no air conditioning in the van = car sickness for Mommy and Daddy and a nap for Ian and Aidan.  Helen helped us check into the hotel, had a very delicious Pizza Hut pizza delivered and stopped to buy us water bottles on our way to checking in.  We ate dinner, Face Timed with our parents, took a walking tour of the spectacular hotel and are now ready to sleep!

Tomorrow will be our first day of touring Beijing.  We are very excited to see all the tourist spots we've been studying about for the past couple of years!

While We're Waiting (14 months) - - and Other HUGE NEWS

March 30, 2014           - 14 months waiting since our LID (log in date in China)
                                     - 22 months waiting since we began our adoption process
                                     - 41 months (3 years, 5 months) since we began the process of adding
                                        to our family

We finished Emma's room - or mostly finished Emma's room.  There are a few small projects that will be completed later on.

 

My sweet friends hosted the BEST.adoption.shower.ever!  There will be an entire post devoted to that fantastic event very soon.  Here are a couple fortunes from the delicious chocolate dipped fortune cookies - very appropriate for the occasion - thanks for leaving your fortunes Jessica and Megan :)

I called the National Visa Center for the cable letter about 226 times - probably about 8 times over the week it took to receive our cable letter.  Perhaps one of the most frustrating experiences in this last phase of paperwork.  No one who worked for the NVC seemed to know what the process was, how long it would take to complete or the answers to any of my questions.  I'm thankful I shared the most frustrating night of 2.5 hours of hold music and recordings with my friend Marianne while we attempted to make curtains for her family room - "we are working hard and will be with you momentarily!"  I finally received the PDF cable letter on March 6 and completed the DS 260 for submission online so our Article 5 could be delivered to the US Embassy in China on March 10.  The Article 5 process is a very specific two week process so our pick up date was set as March 24.

Our passports were couriered to the Chinese Embassy in Chicago to receive our visas.  They were submitted on March 3 and we received them back on March 12.  We have permission to enter China multiple times over the next 12 months and we can stay up to 90 days with each visit!

Another ladybug - a wonderful sign of hope!

Also on March 10, we spent 8 glorious long hours in our allergist's office conducting a rice challenge with Aidan.  For those of you who don't know, Aidan was diagnosed with a rare food intolerance to rice when he was just 6 months old.  Specifically the intolerance is named - Food Protein Induced Entercolitis Syndrome (FPIES) - his body could not digest the protein in rice - if he ingested it, he'd violently vomit until it was cleared from his body.  He'd usually end up in the hospital from severe dehydration and required IV fluids to help him recover. We've spent the last 5 years avoiding any type of rice product at all costs.  So scheduling the appointment to willing feed him rice to see what his reaction might be caused a GREAT amount of stress for this mommy.  The nurses placed an IV, started fluids and we fed him rice and waited and waited.  After spending an uneventful 8 hours with the lovely Dr. Maeve O'Connor and her staff, they sent us home.  Aidan did a fantastic job - he only asked to go home once when they were trying to start the IV for the second time and around 5:45pm, he said, "Mommy, when can we go home, this is taking forever!!"  We continued to feed Aidan increasing amounts of rice over the next few days and weeks.  And he's had no reaction!!  What a blessing.  We are so thankful - this makes traveling to China with Aidan much less stressful.

While Aidan and I spent the day in Dr. O'Connor's office, I received our final update from China - with photos of Emma!  She is stunning - our girl looks amazing in orange!

Aidan continued to enjoy his daily amounts of rice chex.

Pardon the blurry photo from Ian - we received and tried out the Ergo carrier we are taking to China to carry Emma around.  Luckily, Aidan is still small enough I could test it out with him.  But he weighs about 15 lbs more than Emma, and I have NO plans to carry Aidan around China in this carrier - I'm not strong enough!

I've made some hair bows to match Emma's outfits.  Our girl has some seriously cute pig tails - she needs matching sets of bows for her wardrobe!

We had our final beach trip before Emma joins our family.  During our drive to the beach house, I realized I have NO concern about the boys' ability to sleep while traveling - Brian and I may be exhausted, but these two could sleep any place!

  

It was too cool at the beach to enjoy any time out on the beach, but we did have the chance to visit the SC Aquarium - one of their favorite places.  It was stingray feeding time - so both boys had the chance to feed them raw shrimp.

 

With our Article 5 pick up on March 24, we were officially waiting for Travel Approval from CCCWA in China.

Our agency had alerted us that the recent Travel Approvals they'd received had been arriving in about 1-2 weeks.  So we began our wait.

When I was working on some sewing projects Monday morning, I was chatting on the phone with another sewing friend (asking her to help with an order I didn't think I could accept for time reasons), my caller ID flashed and I starting shouting that I'd call her back later - my apologies Jennifer Painter for shouting in your ear, but it was all for a good cause.

Our agency's travel coordinator was calling to tell us that we'd received Travel Approval - in one week!  And we had options about when our "Gotcha Day" could be - April 14 or April 21!  That phone call started 2.5 days of constant phone calls, emails and planning with our adoption agency, a travel agent and the rescheduling of lots of stuff for the next few weeks.

WE ARE LEAVING FOR CHINA IN 7 DAYS!!

We have booked flights to leave Wednesday, April 9.  We will spend a couple days touring Beijing.  Then we will arrive in Emma's province on Sunday, April 13.  Our "Gotcha Day" is Monday, April 14 - our forever family day.  Emma's adoption will be finalized on Tuesday, April 15.  We will spend several days in her province.  We will travel on Friday, April 18 to Guangzhou where the US Consulate Offices are located.  Our Consulate appointment is scheduled on Wednesday, April 23.  We will travel to Hong Kong on Thursday, April 25, spend a day in Hong Kong and depart to the US on Saturday, April 26.  Since we will cross the international date line, we are scheduled to arrive back in Charlotte on Saturday evening, April 26.  (Sorry Salem Sisters - I'll be celebrating our 15th college reunion with our McGinnis Party of Five!)

I will keep you up to date on our plans as we prepare for our trip - stay tuned - - -